Download - AUA Symptom Form

The American Urological Association (AUA) Symptom Index
The Importance of Objective Measurement of Lower Urinary Tract Symptoms in Men with Prostate Cancer

In the world of medicine, there is an important need to communicate information in an objective fashion. Too often, medical information is reported without objectivity. The objective reporting of urinary symptoms is important in many aspects. In situations that involved benign enlargement of the prostate (BPH or benign prostatic hyperplasia), lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) of significant degree adversely affect the quality of our lives. Knowing how severe the symptoms are guides the physician in his intervention with pharmacologic and/or surgical treatments to enhance quality of life. The assessment of effectiveness of any such treatment can be more scientifically done if we have objective measurements before, during and after such treatments.

In men with prostate cancer (PC), objective measurement of LUTS is very important after a diagnosis of PC. If a man has significant problems with LUTS at diagnosis or before local therapy of the prostate with radical prostatectomy (RP), radiation therapy (RT), cryosurgery or androgen deprivation therapy (ADT) or combinations of these treatments, the magnitude of these urinary symptoms will dramatically affect the probability of serious difficulties during and after a particular treatment. For example, a man with moderate to severe LUTS at baseline will have greater problems with aggravation of slow urinary flow, discomfort with urination, possibly with hesitancy in starting the urinary stream and with increased dribbling after urination during and after he has received RT or cryosurgery. This is greater in probability with a larger prostate gland requiring either a larger radiation field (port) or a greater number of seeds or a bigger cryosurgical area of freezing. Within the various forms of RT, this is of relatively less degree with high dose rate brachytherapy or HDR than it is with permanent seed implants. Patients with large prostate glands that cannot be reduced in size by ADT or in patients whose LUTS does not improve dramatically with medical therapies, are often advised to undergo a RP to improve the LUTS and to avoid the problems that commonly occur with RT or cryosurgery in such a setting.

The AUA Symptom Index is therefore presented here to focus on these issues in an attempt to bring you a better outcome. Print this form out and bring it with you to your physician. If you have a high symptom index, the use of medical therapies may be immensely beneficial. If these are not effective then the counsel your physician gives you regarding primary therapy of PC may be altered as suggested above.

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Download AUA Symptom Index Form.rtf - Right click the link and choose "Save Target As" or "Save Link As". File type is for Microsoft Word 2000/7.0/97 and other word processors.

Download AUA Symptom Index Form.zip - Contains the file in "zipped" format for easier downloading. File type is for Microsoft Word 2000/7.0/97 and other word processors.

Download AUA Symptom Index Form.pdf - Contains the file in Adobe Acrobat "PDF" format for universal viewing and printing.

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